From coast to coast, community, rural, and critical access hospitals are facing industry change and asking themselves how they’ll survive as an independent organization—or if it’s possible at all. Is your hospital among them?

bestPT simplifies scheduling and patient relationship management through the use of it’s revolutionary workflow management process. This system enables practice owners to keep track of their patient visits, along with all other relevant work, in a single location. bestPT helps practice owners create a systematic patient relationship management process while providing them complete quality monitoring and control.

The argument for increased patient engagement is compelling: Improved health outcomes. Increased reimbursement opportunities. Reduced workload for front-office staff. Patient portals are the first step—and under Meaningful Use stages 2 and 3, they are mandatory. Yet how can you overcome patient resistance—and help your patients actively engage in their health?

Your first step towards thriving through the rise of self-pay can begin right now. In this free webinar, you’ll learn strategies for solid practice management, how to develop a specific plan to improve self-pay patient payments and essential staff training tips.

Join self-pay expert Emily Putnam as she discusses:

How to create a self-pay policy—and what every strategy should include

Last week CMS essentially reversed their compliance date stance for the Meaningful Use program in what amounted to a big smack in the face to any health care provider that has put in the effort and time to knock Stage 2 out of the park. Providers working hard to successfully meet the Stage 2 measures shouldn’t feel that it is all for naught. You are on the cutting edge of using technology to deliver better care, and that makes you some of the best care providers out there.

Join athenahealth CEO Jonathan Bush for a special keynote address on common physician pain points, followed by an exclusive Q&A and expert-led sessions.

“Where does it hurt?” is a common question caregivers may ask their patients. But when was the last time that question was posed to the caregivers themselves? That’s exactly what Mr. Bush believes we, as an industry and as a country, need to do more often. At this special event, we’ll discuss these common pain points and industry challenges, with:

New and seasoned Practice Managers and Physicians know that handling the day to day tasks of running a medical practice can be time consuming. Administrative tasks and responsibilities have increased with ever-changing government regulations, Medicare laws, and legal concerns. Efficiency appears to be a losing battle, and stressful workflows take a toll on delivering compassionate patient care. A paperless office was presented as a time and cost saving endeavor that would lead to better patient care. Or was it a trick?

Sound familiar?

A polished representative came to the office to demonstrate their EMR, Practice Management, and Medical Billing system. You were convinced, “this is the solution, what a relief, Ah…!” Thousands of dollars and countless hours spent on implementation and training. Finally, the “go live” date arrived. Then, reality hit; the staff forgot how to upload documents, the doctor was in the exam room trying unsuccessfully to view an MRI with the patient, and you frantically tried to fix the issues. The workflow stopped as panic took over. You finally phoned customer support and you were placed on hold. “Ugh,” you began to question…”How much longer will the learning curve actually take?” “Did I make the right system selection?” “Why did I try to improve efficiency?” “It really wasn’t that bad and where is that polished sales person now?”

This week athenahealth resigned from the Electronic Health Records Association (EHRA), the trade association that ostensibly represents the collective interests of the EHR industry in the many Washington, D.C.-based policy debates that impact EHR vendors and, by extension, their care provider clients. Members since late 2011, we joined the EHRA hoping to utilize the organization as a forum to spread our often-distinct points of view on particular issues — like the then-relatively-new Meaningful Use program — that were gaining prominence in the national debate over healthcare reform.

Late Friday afternoon, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) jointly announced some timeline changes for stages 2 and 3 of meaningful use. Stage 2 will be extended one year, pushing the start date for stage 3 back to 2017. Providers will have an extra year to meet stage 2 requirements, just like they did with stage 1.

According to the press release, “The goal of this change is two-fold: first, to allow CMS and ONC to focus efforts on the successful implementation of the enhanced patient engagement, interoperability and health information exchange requirements for Stage 2; and second, to utilize data from Stage 2 participation to inform policy decisions for Stage 3.”